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Miller's FFF experiment/ Different FFF species?
Miller's FFF experiment
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I read Miller's FFF experiment last March 2 at:
http://www.actwin.com/fish/aquatic-plants/month.200003/msg00502.html
Its tone and tenor were very different from his posts of a 2-days ago. It
described the FFF as having quickly removed the green hair algae from their
tank. His description of the nibbling of the FFF on Dwarf Hairgrass is
unremarkable. I personally, would not start an aquarium w/ dwarf
Hairgrass; I'd reserve it for a more established tank that's beyond the
algae wars. His own "experiment" in no supports his "way-out-there"
conclusion of the last two days that the FFF did enough damage to the
plants to CAUSE an algae problem.
How Miller could have drawn the conclusions of the past two days from the
same experiment is beyond me.
Still, IMHO it was no experiment. It had no control with which to judge
the results. Back then, Roger S. Miller was willing to acknowledge this
point when he said;
"Beard algae and the short, black filamentous algae both made brief
appearances in the tank and then disappeared. I think that swordtails
grazed both types of algae, but I can't say how much of the algae's
disappearance was caused by grazing and how much might have been due to the
algae's failure to thrive in the tank."
Such a question (among many others) could have been addressed by a control.
I think one can reasonably postulate that the loss of 'Beard algae and the
short, black filamentous algae' was most likely due to the fact that the
aquarium's conditions would not support their maintenance. Especially
since the Swordtail's aquarium had 25% less fish than did the FFF tank!
Such conditions as unequal fish load would obviously serve to promote algae
growth in the FFF tank and suppress it in the swordtail's tank.
Different FFF species?
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There are several questions regarding whether or not we listers are in fact
dealing with 2 or more types of fish with very different temperments toward
their tankmates. Its hard for me to reconcile the friendly fish that I and
others know, with some of the descriptions of others. I for one, thought I
was being very conservative in the potential of the FFF to be territorial
during breeding.
It is not beyond the rhelm of possibility that we are dealing with 2
species. I found this post from Richard Sexton in response to a question
Wed, 15 Mar 2000:
<start>
" >>>Jordanella floridae and 2. American Flag Fish , Ameca Splendens -
Butterfly
>>Goodeid? Which one is best for a planted tank? Does it matter >>>which
one to
>>>buy? Which one is most often found in the fish stores in the >>USA?
Jordanella floridae is an egg laying tooth carp ("killifish")
Ameca splendens is a livebearing tooth carp (livebearer).
J. floridae is properly know as the "American Flag Fish". A.
splendend is commonly known as the "Butterfly goodied". I've
never seen it referred to as a flag fish.
They both eat algae."
<end>
AFAIK, the Butterfly goodied (Ameca splendens) is a truly aggressive
costumer. I've never had them but if it is possible that they bear any
resemblance to FFF, or if they are being marketed by some AS FFF, then that
could be responsible for some of the descriptions of aggression that were
related.
Plants & Driftwood:
http://www.floridadriftwood.com